Whole fish are usually filleted for cooking by using a long bladed filleting knife having a handle and cutting blade conventionally formed and arranged with respect to one another. In the alternative, sportsmen in the wild may also use short bladed hunting knives with relatively thick rigid blades. One of the primary disadvantages of cutting instruments of these types is that when they are used in the filleting process, especially for panfish having differing skeletal structures, it requires that the hand of the user be virtually touching the horizontal surface upon which the fish is placed for filleting. For smaller, flat boned pan fish such as bass, crappies, blue gills, walleye and the like, the combined thickness of the users hand and the knife handle will not permit the blade to be positioned generally parallel to the fish backbone and to the surface upon which the fish is placed. Additionally, knives of the aforedescribed type are ergonomically arranged so that the human arm and hand are most comfortable when gripping the handle and urging the blade in a cutting motion away from the body of the user. Use in other knife orientations may require re-orienting the manner of grasping the handle to one which is awkward and, perhaps, less safe. In particular, such knives tend to cause the user to experience arm and wrist discomfort if employed for long periods for fish filleting since the primary cutting motion is laterally side to side rather than downward.
In addition, conventional knives have generally linear, uninterrupted (i.e., non-serrated) cutting edges which have proven to be less than fully satisfactory for tactile sensing of the precise location of fish rib and back bones. As is known to those skilled in the art, the ability to sense the structure of the fish by tactile means when performing the filleting process is important in terms of both rapidity of preparation and preservation of edible tissue.
With knives of the aforedescribed type, it is common to find them equipped with handles made of wood or other composition materials which may tend to deteriorate over time and which, in any event, are more apt to retain odors or small bits of tissue than would be a handle made of a steel material. In addition, knives of the aforedescribed type almost universally include a blade and a handle, the orientation of which may not be modified, one with respect to the other. The manufacture of such conventional knives also involves several steps including the procuring and forming of the handle material and the attachment of the finished handle to the cutting blade. In addition, the arrangement of conventional knives necessarily requires that the user's hand be located adjacent the fish in a horizontal, spaced relation therefrom rather than directly over the work area, the latter being preferred for accuracy and ease of preparation.